Charlie Sheen: I've Never Been Drunk or High on Set

Charlie Sheen is ready to get back to work – but says he’s grateful for the time off he’s been forced to take.

Appearing Wednesday on radio program the Dan Patrick Show, which is simulcast on DIRECTV, the actor was asked if CBS had made him stop working so he can get healthy.

Before answering Sheen, 45, paused to have a drink of water, saying he had a dry mouth. He joked that people would be thinking, ” ‘Oh my god, what does he mean a dry mouth? He’s smoking crack again.’ ”

On a more serious note, the actor said he is “supremely grateful” for the support he’s gotten from network, which shut down production of Two and a Half Men so the star could recover.

“People need to understand how supremely grateful I am that somebody stepped in here,” he said. “Basically, Viacom showed up at my house and said, ‘Dude, dude, it’s getting really obvious and we’re really worried about you We care about your health. They came in and man to man said, ‘We have to shut it down.’ This was the only person in my life with the power to do this.”

Sheen said that that he had “never been drunk – [and] never been high on the set once.” Still, he confessed he’d been showing up in rough shape without having slept and would ask the director to move his mark so he could lean on a piece of furniture for support.

Asked about the response Sheen has gotten to his last interview on the radio show, in which he confessed that he’d “bored out of his tree” when he was sober for five years, Sheen joked, “I was elected President of the United States of America. I don’t know if you heard.”

But more important to Sheen is that he is ready to get back to making his hit CBS show. “[The crew] goes back on the 28th. I go back [March] 1st. I’m just on standby. I’m training. I’m eating well.”

He also offered up a bit of advice for another troubled star, Lindsay Lohan. “Work on your impulse control,” Sheen said. “Just try to think things through a little bit before you do them.”